Defiant LPG dealers to face action: Ramzan

Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Feb 20: Minister for Consumer Affairs and Public Distribution (CA&PD) and Transport, Ch. Mohammad Ramzan today directed the oil companies to ensure home delivery of LPG within the municipal limits of the twin cities of Srinagar and Jammu from today onwards, while warning that any dealer found violating the order will be dealt under rules.
The Minister gave directions at a high level meeting here this afternoon convened to review the implementation of the decisions taken in previous meeting, including the start of home delivery of LPG in the two cities of Jammu and Srinagar.
The representatives of LPG dealers of both the twin cities were present and assured the Minister that directions from the Government are being implemented in letter and spirit on the ground.
The Minister, however, said that on spot delivery of the LPG has been extended up to February 28 , 2013 due to unavoidable circumstances. He gave clear directions to all the LPG dealers to do away with the spot delivery from February 28 and said that any dealer found continuing with the on spot delivery would face strict action.
Secretary CAPD & Transport, Mohammad Abass, Director CAPD Jammu, Parvize Malik, State Level Co-ordinator, IOC, R.K Shahab, Senior Regional Manager HPCL, Ashwani Kumar Gupta, Assistant Manager BPCL, Ankur Mishra, Manager IOCL, Ajay Kumar Wazir, President of LPG distributors of Jammu, Siddharth, Senior Sales Officer HPCL Kashmir, Haroon Hamid and LPG dealers of Jammu and Srinagar were present in the meeting.
Asking the consumers of twin cities to make their bookings for refilling of LPG with respective dealers in advance, the Minister said that the cooperation of consumers was necessary for ensuring the distribution of cooking gas to the legitimate consumers at their doorstep in a time bound manner. He said that Government is taking every step to bring uniformity in distribution of LPG among the consumers by taking the decision to stop on spot delivery strictly and hope that the consumers would be greatly facilitated in due course of time.
The Minister also asked the consumers to get the new subsidized gas connections on the prescribed rates already fixed by all oil companies recently. The rate fixed for the new LPG connection is Rs 4364 with two filled gas cylinders at subsidized rates along with other accessories, excluding stove.
Referring to the frequent complaints lodged by the consumers against LPG gas dealers, the Minister directed both the CAPD directors of Kashmir and Jammu to take stern action against those found involved in malpractices.